Essence
by EvaRayWonder
Summary: Madame Fate is the new villain in town, and when she sends the essence of the Titans into the past, Raven must travel through the history of her friends in order to save their lives.
1. The Past

Raven wound her way through the dark jungle, stepping over fallen trees and dodging the plant covered limbs that drooped over her. Strange flying insects buzzed about around her and added to the symphony of animal calls seeping from the darkness. Raven was simply attempting to continue onward, with no sense of direction. Her mind drifted to only a few hours earlier when she had been in an alleyway battling the strangest villain she had ever encountered.

"_You can't kill me Titans," the strange woman had hissed, "I have hidden my essence safely in this time and as long as I terrorize this lovely city I shall never die!" This odd statement was followed by a laughter that sounded half-crazed. Her eyes darted to each Titan as she backed away farther down the gloom of the alley._

"_Then we'll just have to kick your butt to Australia." Cyborg retorted. The Titans assumed their usual fighting stance and waited for that routine command,_

"_Titans, GO!"_

_The mad woman simply laughed as she turned to run into the thick darkness in the alleyway. The Titans raced after her and began to surround her on all sides as she ran, she was quite human in her speed and wasn't exactly a marathon runner. The Titans quickly had two flying angels above her, a lime-green tiger running behind her on the left and a robotic man sprinting on her behind right. Suddenly an acrobat flipped in front of her and quickly cut her off. The woman screeched to a halt and looked at Robin with a glint of confidence in her eye. _

"_Do you know what happens when the body and the essence are separated into different times?" She asked him as though she were a teacher asking a student. "The body becomes NOTHING!" _

_And with that the figure of a woman transformed into a huge silver dragon with claws and teeth of a magical material. The dragon was beautiful, yet it's scales were blinding as a single ray of light from one of the buildings reflected upon them. The Titans each had to shield their eyes from the sudden brightness and it was within that instant that their lives changed._

_A blast of energy came from the dragon and flew in all directions, hitting each of the titans in turn. Raven felt her body being pushed backwards and expected to feel the pain of falling on the building roof as she fell. But she didn't. Raven opened her eyes to find herself surrounded by nothing but… nothing. There was nothing beneath her or above. She felt nothing as she brought her hand to her face. _

"_Well," she said to herself, "I'm not in Kansas anymore."_

_She felt a slight pang from her stomach at the moment and quickly looked down to see her signature of a raven formed by her black energy. But something was wrong, the bird was trying to _escape. _Her soul-self was trying it's hardest to fly as far away as it could. It finally managed to wriggle free and began to float into the nothing. _

_Raven suddenly felt exhausted and confused. "No…" she whispered as she watched her soul-self float away. "…No…" she said again as she took a step toward it. This was apparently a mistake as Raven suddenly felt her world fly upside down. It was as though she was standing on her head, but she didn't want to fall… upward? 'I need my soul-self.' She thought desperately. She could almost still see it hovering on the edge of her mind. So she closed her eyes, and lunged towards it as she left everything else behind. _

_She awoke in a vast jungle, her knees rested on a bed of leaves and soft dirt. She glanced up to see a cloud of green from all the trees surrounding her. A movement in her arms caused her to stare down and see her soul-self reentering her body. Once the last wisp disappeared she immediately felt as though someone had just given her the most relaxing cup of herbal tea in the world._

That had been hours ago. Raven still had no idea where she was, or where her friends were for that matter. She was lost and confused, and not to mention a tad bit annoyed seeing as the same bugs kept biting… and biting… Finally Raven released a tidal wave of energy, creating a huge hole around her. The tree trunks around her had parts removed and the limbs currently above her had disappeared. But then, the bugs had too.

Raven smirked at her work until she felt the sting of another insect biting her. Raven felt her whole face turn red with fury. A moment later she was hiking through the jungle again, with an orb of black energy holding body parts of what used to be an insect trailing behind her. 'That'll teach 'em.'

She continued on for what seemed like hours. She came to several places where the vines were too thick to walk through, so she simply changed her direction. She had no idea where she was going, and the canopy was too thick for her to fly through. She could have blasted her way through but those last two blasts of her energy seemed to be having effects on her. Apparently she had either used too much or she hadn't fully recovered from reabsorbing her soul-self.

"When will this ever end?" She sighed.

She then brushed away a rather thick vine to stare into two green orbs that stared back. Taken by surprise, she fell backwards onto the soft jungle floor.

"Sorry!" The child yelled. "I didn't mean to scare you!" He ran over to help her sit up, and she was able to see him clearly.

He was green.

She stared aghast at the boy as he smiled at her.

"My name is Garfield Logan. What's yours?"


	2. Essence

"My name is Garfield Logan. What's yours?"

Gar… field? Raven told herself that it was not possible. 'It's not real. I'm in a dream. Someone wake me up.' And with that, a nearby fallen limb shattered into splinters.

Garfield jumped at the sight of the limb and almost turned to run. Raven sighed and quickly controlled her breathing in an attempt to calm herself down. She shouldn't be stressed out over a silly dream. Breathe in, breathe out. Azarath Metrion Zinthos. Azarath… Metrion… control… calm… need of herbal tea…

'I hate kids.' Raven thought miserably.

Young Garfield began to become restless during Raven's attempt to calm down and fiddled with some twigs on the ground. Almost as though he had forgotten that just seconds before Raven had frightened him with her powers. Raven looked at young Garfield again and studied his movements. He was still growing, but his shortness was not a big change from the "real" Beast Boy. His arms were two skinny bean poles shooting out from his sleeves. He had hair that looked as though someone had attempted to comb it with little success, and some blotches of dirt on his face. He had the same eyes as the real Beast Boy though, deep green forests that almost seemed to hold something wild.

Young Garfield looked at her again. "Who are you?" He asked rather bluntly.

Raven shook her head. Definitely a dream. "Just think of me as a figment of your imagination." She replied. She didn't know why she didn't tell him her name. Maybe she was just being paranoid, but she had the feeling that she shouldn't tell him who she was.

Beast Boy blinked, and then proceeded to give her his signature grin.

"If you're a figment of my imagination, can you do anything I want?" He asked.

"I don't take orders from anybody shorter than five feet."

"Can you fly?"

"…Yes…"

"Show me!"

Raven sighed. "I already told you I don't – "

"Why is your hair purple?"

"It's my natur – "

"Why are you wearing a blanket?"

"It's not a blanket, it's a clo – "

"Why is your skin so – "

"ENOUGH!" Raven yelled as a nearby sea of vines burst into black flames. Beast Boy stared, frightened at the sight. Then, as quickly as he had appeared Beast Boy was gone.

Breathe in, breathe out. What did she expect from a little kid anyway? Raven despised children, but then this was a dream. Raven desperately needed to wake up now. She stretched her arm in front of her body and stared at the pale gray flesh. Wake up… She quickly pinched her forearm and felt the sting of pain. Pain? Okay, maybe sometimes you _can_ feel pain in dreams. This had to be one of those times.

Raven began hiking in the direction that Beast Boy had run. She really had no idea where he had gone, she had never been very good at tracking. This was Beast Boy anyway, he was probably using some sort of heightened animal sense to hide his tracks even more. Therefore Raven soon found herself very lost just like earlier. Nothing to do but move forward.

Moving forward… What a strange phrase. Especially since Raven didn't know which way forward _was_.

She finally saw an opening in the plants ahead. Hope rising, Raven walked a little faster towards what was looking more and more like a small clearing. She finally reached the edge of the trees and found herself in front of a cozy little house sitting in the small clearing. It had some bits of machinery surrounding it, computers and satellites sitting underneath little canopy tents. Through the windows Raven could see some lab equipment resting on a counter next to a sink.

Looking closer Raven saw that there was a woman inside. Raven immediately retreated behind a tree in order to avoid detection. Raven told herself to try and avoid all contact with others until she found out what had happened. Maybe… this isn't a dream.

Unexpectedly Beast Boy's younger self ran from somewhere else in the jungle into the clearing. He made a beeline for the house's front door and was through the door with speed Raven had not expected of him at that age. Raven watched as his mother scooped him up into her arms and gave him the kind of hug that parents give their kids after the child just took their first solo trip to grandma's and back. A face of worry and anxiety that melts into a satisfied pride and joy. They looked so… perfect standing there. It was definitely a moment to remember. Raven felt a small pang when she realized that she didn't really know how that felt… being held like that.

Beast Boy smiled at his mom and said something to her gleefully. She responded with a parent's loving grin and a quick remark. They held an entire conversation full of laughter and excitement. Raven had never seen anything like it. It was amazing.

Then Beast Boy must have felt a need to explore some more, because he was soon walking through the threshold and out into the jungle. He turned around to wave to his mother and then his back disappeared into the trees. His mother waved cheerfully until he was gone. Her face fell, and a look of worry mixed with love reflected on her entire being. It was in that moment that Raven felt the strange sense.

She felt _Beast Boy_. Yet, it wasn't the Beast Boy she knew. This was a feeling of Beast Boy's _soul_. Raven had heard of this before, but she had never experienced it.

It was sometimes said that the body and the "essence" could be separated by a hand of very powerful magic. The "essence" was sometimes called the soul, but it was not the same as the soul. Raven had thought that the difference was that the essence was more of was influence that person, made them what they were. While the soul was always there, the essence could change, sometimes even take form if separated from the body. Perhaps then… that insane woman from before was actually a witch? That would mean that this woman had found a way to separate the essence from the body, which explains Raven almost losing her soul-self which meant…

Things had gotten rather bad.


	3. Fast Pace

Raven searched her mind for the solution to her ever growing problem. She could remember reading a text on these kinds of spells, but she was unable to quite remember how it was reversed. What was it?

She recalled a passage that detailed how to return the essence to the body, which was simply to lay it atop the body. But each person has a different essence, and each essence has a different form when removed from the body. Hers had been in the form of her soul-self but Garfield's could be anything. Usually the essence will take the shape of a material object she remembered from the text. Was her soul-self an object? Ah well, Raven was not a usual person anyway.

Raven decided that the best thing to do would be to first find Garfield's essence and see what form it had taken. She watched intently from the trees as Beast Boy's mother went about the chores for the day. Hanging up damp laundry, cleaning dirty lab equipment and picking up a few worn out toys in front of the yard. Beast Boy's mother seemed to run on automatic pilot as she moved to and fro across the thresholds of the little house. Occasionally Raven felt a snatch of the red flavored essence that was Beast Boy, but it never truly lingered in one place.

After watching Gar's mother for almost thirty minutes Raven had a suspicion that Beast Boy's essence had something to do with his mother and whenever she paused. Occasionally his mother would freeze with an anxious look on her face and raise a slender hand to touch just underneath her shirt collar. Perhaps she was wearing a necklace? But why would that contain Beast Boy's essence?

Soon after Raven had this theory Garfield's mother began to slow down her pace and occasionally rest in a tattered old chair outside the front door. Finally his mother plopped down on the chair and rested her head against the house wall. Raven paused a moment and listened intently until she actually heard a few deep snores traveling across the open clearing to the tree line. This was Raven's chance to try and search for Beast Boy's essence.

Raven began to slowly walk towards the small house but then realized the noise she made by stepping on blades of grass and breaking the occasional twig. She tried to levitate, seeing as her powers had obviously returned after the conversation with Garfield, but nothing happened. She tried again, nothing. Why were her powers not working? Raven ran back to the tree line and felt the magic she had not noticed earlier in her haste. Raven stepped outside the circle and levitated a few inches off the ground. Slowly she moved back into the clearing and quickly fell to the ground once her feet crossed into the sun. There was a magic barrier around the clearing preventing her from using her powers. Raven was not sure if that was the work of that mad woman from the alleyway or from the magic of Beast Boy's essence, but she needed to hurry and find Gar's essence before his mother woke up.

Raven began again to slink as gracefully as possible up to the cabin. She softly cursed the crunching and crinkling of leaves that paraded with her feet. Thankfully Beast Boy's mother did not wake up when Raven came to stand next to the old chair by the wall. But this is where Raven's luck ran out. His mother had hair past her shoulders. Raven would have thought it pretty if it were not blocking Raven's way to the necklace glinting around the sleeping mother's neck. Gar's mother took this moment to let out an extra loud snore and toss her head backwards, completely blocking the end of the chain with her neck and head.

"…Shit…" Raven muttered under her breath.

Raven sighed and prepared herself for the worst. She gently placed her left hand on the mother's forehead and her right hand on the back of the head. Very slowly Raven pushed her head forward enough to leave a gap between her hair and her neck, enough maybe for a slender hand to reach through. Raven saw the clasp of the golden chain and could see it faintly glowing. _Beast Boy's essence_ raced through her mind and her heartbeat quickened.

Raven rested his mother's head in her left hand while carefully reaching behind her neck with the right. She lightly grasped the clasp and fumbled with it trying to get it undone. She fiddled with the darn thing for several minutes and felt her left hand falling asleep from the weight of the head against it. Raven grew clumsy, and felt the mother begin to fidget in her sleep. Suddenly an arm came up to scratch the back of her neck just as Raven finally undid the clasp. Raven jumped at the sudden movement and dropped the head while pulling the chain towards her. Raven saw the mother jerk awake and fell backwards in her haste to run away, the chain was now in Raven's hands.

Raven closed her eyes for what would come next; a hysterical woman beating the living daylights out of Raven for trespassing. But nothing happened. Raven opened her eyes and saw Beast Boy's mother in the exact position she had been in when Raven had closed her eyes. What?

Raven stood up in confusion, but just as she did so the world began to blur and spiral in front of Raven's eyes. Like something out of Twilight Zone, everything went faded and distorted until it righted itself to a new scene. Raven now found herself in a huge laboratory full of machines and computers with dazzling lights everywhere. She heard voices and instinctively hid in a closet nearby. The voices came nearer, and the sound of a door opening brought them into the open so that Raven could hear what was being said.

"Dude when I throw the ball you have to _catch_ it! Not let it hit you in your face!"

"Shut up it was a total bad throw and you know it!"

"Oh no you did not just dis the Stone-man! I throw better than anyone on the team!"

"Whatever! You couldn't hit a parked car!"

The two boys continued to quarrel as they walked down the stairs into the lab. The topic immediately changed when they hit level ground.

"Dude, are you sure your parents won't get mad if we're in here?"

"Oh no they'll get mad as hell. That's why we don't let them catch us. Seriously, you think my parents would willingly let me around all this crap?"

"Then why are we in here again?"

"Because you don't want your mom to know you were playing 'that wretched game' of football again, and this is where my parents keep the good stuff for patching up black eyes. Chill out, they won't catch us. They went to the grocery store."

"But that was twenty minutes ago"

"They won't come back for another twenty minutes. They know it takes a lot of food to fill up the captain of the football team! Boo-ya!"

Raven felt a jolt at this phrase. She thought she had recognized that voice! So now she had to find the essence for –

"Victor Stone! Get out of the laboratory right now! You know you're not aloud in there!"

"Aw shit mom's home!"


	4. Cyborg

Hey guys, this is just preview with another fun cliffie. I just didn't want to leave you guys hanging and let you know that I am still here! This chapter is not finished, the chapters are going to be longer from now on. You will know what happens to Cyborg and his parents and what Cyborg's essence object is. Can anyone guess what it is? I hope to update soon. I'm sorry guys -.-;; I have ADD. I'm actually serious, I do have ADD. I take a pill for it everyday when I have school. It's very hard for me to do something, even something that I love like this story, for longer than fifteen minutes.

* * *

"Victor Stone you get out of that Laboratory before you break something or you won't see that filthy piece of leather for a week!"

"C'mon mom! It's not like we're juggling test tubes! We just need a bandaid!"

The silhouette of a woman appeared at the top of the stairs. When she stepped into the amazing light of the laboratory a wave of something else covered the room. Something clean, motherly. Her face was like a stone statue, the only weathering of it was from the wind and rain. Nothing else could break it. Not a hair seemed to escape from the bun she had placed on top of her head. Her glasses had no specks or prints to be seen and looked like new. Her lab coat and shoes shone with a white would rather repel dirt than attract it. Her face was contorted in such a way that Raven was sure that the woman was about to explode.

"I don't care! If you need a bandaid, ask an assistant! I don't trust you in the lab by yourself. Especially with those hooligans you call friends."

The injured boy next to Victor took the opportunity to present a very rude gesture to Victor's mother, which only elevated her anger. Cyborg however did not seem to care that the boy showed any such gesture to his mother. _Where's his respect?_ But as Raven examined his face she realized that this was not Cyborg. This was Victor Stone. Victor was a regular boy, no robotics on him at all. He had an air about him that made others know that he was invincible. _Not so true._ Raven's attention flew back to his mother in the doorway and her soon to happen explosion. But before she could unleash her wrath on her son she was distracted by footsteps coming down the stairway and a calm, deep voice.

"What are you two young boys doing here?"

This had to be Cyborg's dad. Raven felt a wave of excitement. Victor's father, the man he had only spoken of. Raven knew the influence that this man had as a dad and as a genius scientist. Cyborg had always spoken of some sort of experiment that his father was obsessed with. It had something to do with time travel. But what became of the experiment Raven had never heard because Cyborg always fell silent towards the end. _I wonder what happened?_ It must have been a painful memory, but then again, any memory of Cyborg's parents was painful.

Raven snapped out of her pondering to see that Cyborg's dad was nothing special. He looked like the average Joe. Feeling slightly disappointed, Raven pursued her mission to eavesdrop with even more vigilance.

"We're just looking for a bandage dad, nothing to get all worked up about."

"At our laboratory? Why can't you look at home? We have plenty of bandages."

Raven was shocked. She had been under the assumption that they were in some sort of basement. Cyborg had always said that his parents lived at their work, but she thought he had meant literally. She quickly scoped the room a little bit more and saw several cots in the corner. _Ah._

"I'm sorry dad I just wanted to say hi."

_Aww._

"Well I'm sorry but you're gonna have to come by another time, it's not safe here today son."

_Huh? Safe?_

Victor's mom exploded.

"SAFE? OF COURSE IT'S NOT SAFE! HE'S OFF THERE PLAYING THAT DRATTED FOOSEBALL AGAIN, BREAKING HIS ARM, HIS NECK, AND PROBABLY HIS HEAD! DO SOMETHING SILAS BEFORE HE DIES!"

Silas Stone simply looked at Victor with a worried face, and Victor stared back with a stubborn glare before replying to his mother's sweet comment.

"I'm not defected. You can't fix me old man. All you do is make it worse. Safe? I'm fine old man. I got me, myself, and I. I don't need you."

And as if to prove his point Victor tossed the football that he had been gripping into the air in one graceful gesture. He then caught it perfectly, as though he had been practicing for weeks.

Both of Victor's parents showed faces of absolute horror, which pleased Victor to no end. Eleanor Stone exploded again, or imploded, Raven could not decide which.

"VICTOR STONE YOU GET OUT OF THIS LABORATORY RIGHT NOW OR I'M GONNA-"

In the middle of her speech Cyborg chuckled and tossed the ball into the air again to prove his point a second time.

Only this time, he didn't catch it.


End file.
